April

I can't believe how bad I've become at blogging! I used to get to it once a week. Now, it's once a month. So here is the grand smorgasbord of April!

I've been bad at teaching the boys to write thank you cards for gifts. So we finally got to a few for their birthday presents.

 Collin finally had his 5 year, Well Check Exam at the the doctors. No shots. Phew. I didn't know if I'd be able to hold him down if he did. 
He passed everything with flying colors, including the eye exam.
When reading the lines, he'd name appropriately... "circle, sailboat, American flag"... then when he came to the plus sign.... "the cross".
I'm almost surprised he didn't include, that Jesus died on for our sins.

It snowed. Ew.

One Friday, Trav came home for lunch, then announced he wasn't going back! Score. Fun surprise for all. So he took the boys to a movie and I tried blogging, but my awesome computer was being awesome again, so I took Missy Moo out to the tramp with me instead! I read a little and we soaked up the sun. It felt very luxurious.

Sometime when you tell the Taco Bell worker you'd like LOTS of mild, they deliver. In the way of 54 packets. For serious. Spanks, Taco Bell worker.

The first two days of Spring Break I wanted to have the boys do something for someone else. I just remember last year, feeling disenchanted with an entire week of me spending lots of time, money and effort entertaining their every whim and desire. I vowed that for all Spring Breaks in the future, we would work in some service too. 

So I got this idea from my cousin, Leah... we went to the store and got pots and flowers, then I let them paint the pots and plant the flowers. We gave one to the "bully" in Collin's class that lives a street over from us. Turns out, his parents were on the driveway with him when we walked up. So I got a chance to meet them and Collin and the boy played for a bit. We gave the other to a friend down the street.

The second day, our idea got us in pretty deep. Sounded simple... make cookies for our primary teachers at church. But see, Weston had 3 since he's in nursery. And they lived all over Timbuktu. We spent hours driving around. Bah!

Just because she is so stinin' cute!!! LOVE this girl.

Lots of days having Lilly and Rubi over, or Collin and Weston going to their house. Friends are the best. They love Leap Frog.

Girls just wanna have fun. These 4 crack me up. (And they did this all to themselves!)

Why am I so obsessed with her thumb sucking?! It's so dang cute.

I bought these gorgeous Gerbera Daisies and tried my hardest to get a cute picture of Olive with them. My photography skills are amazzzzing. If amazing means laughable. Oh well.

Look, Mom.. MUSCLES!

On Easter, Brinn asked how old Olive was. I said, "Ohhh, about 6 months." Trav looked over at me, concerned and said, "No, she's almost 8 months." I frowned, and shook my head, "No, she's only 6 months!" He contested me again, so I whipped out my fingers and started counting from August. My jaw dropped. AHHH! "Oh my gosh!!! You're right! How did that happen?!!" So I lost 2 months of my baby's life. I'm such a good Mom. 

So here she is at 8 months, having her first rice cereal. She liked it! A first for my kids.

On a different day, Weston helped me feed her her first baby food.. peas. She gobbled them up! He was thrilled.

It looks like I have an obsessive problem with her, but remember, this is over a whole month! ;)

Josie came for a visit! The boys love her. We spent lots of late nights, talking. We also had a girls night for Megan's birthday at my house while she was here. Yummy salted caramel blondies and home made ice cream. It was a fun night.

That same night, I made this amazing broccoli and beef. The colors were so pretty I had to take a picture. Find the recipe at Mel's Kitchen Cafe. It was a rather involved recipe, but the product is worth it. This is a keeper.

The last 2 days of April were Cray-zee!!

Tuesday night, I spoke at our Relief Society activity about simplifying. Holy stress. But it was good, and I learned a lot. The women were really nice and I felt good about it... after it was over of course. :)

Then, the next day, I was in charge of Pack meeting for Cubscouts. I don't usually decorate or go all out for these things, but I found a fun plan online and went with it. The theme for April was Faith and this plan used Flying as a platform. So I had white balloons, "clouds" and airplanes hanging from the ceiling, had a paper airplane making station, and had snacks and water like you'd get on a airplane. I had the boys work on a skit the week before and made these ridiculous pinwheels for props. I spent a lot of time trying to track down a pilot to come speak to the boys. Well, it all tanked. 7 boys showed up, all crazy and obnoxious. Only one parent came. The pilot text me half way through the meeting to say he couldn't make it. When it was all over, several of the boys grabbed at the balloon decoration and tore it the ground, then started stomping on it. I lost it right about then. I didn't go all berserk on them, but they knew I was done. Cubscouts are frustrating!!! Especially when their parents aren't supportive.

So right after pack meeting ended, I went into the bathroom to change and go speak to the Young Men and Young Women from both wards for their Teen Elect night about Etiquette. I had a Power Point presentation and showed a clip from Christmas Story where Ralphie's brother is eating like a piggie. :) The room was full of kids, more boys than girls, and I was NERVOUS. Didn't help that some boys started whistling and cat calling when I walked up. Seriously?! These boys. They weren't super rude after that, but they definitely had sarcastic/immature comments throughout. The girls were great though. I gotta say, I was done with boys after this night. When my presentation was over, the kids went into the gym to eat their dinner, using the etiquette we had just gone over. The leaders asked me to come up with a quiz to give them over the material they had learned. Walking out of there was a huge sigh of relief. I was so excited to sleep that night!! I had been up til 2am the night before and similar times all the week before that with Josie over. Way too late for a momma that usually calls it quits at 10pm!

*Not Pictured*
I don't know how we didn't take even ONE picture, but on the last Saturday in April- Brinn, Megan, Josie and I had a little girl's getaway in Albuquerque for Megan's birthday. It was a surprise that went wrong on so many levels, but still ended up really fun. I caught some sort of stomach bug the night before and was up ALL NIGHT with it. Even with all my usual stomach issues, I'd never felt that sick before. I barely managed to get in the car Saturday morning. Then, I had originally planned on us going to the St. James Tea Room, because Megan loved it, but go figure... you have to reserve a room wayyy in advance. Calling 3 days beforehand didn't cut it. So at least I was able to schedule some massages for us. Psych. Well, yes, I did schedule them, but in all my stomach woes, we were sitting at lunch when it suddenly popped in my head to check the time! Yup, 1/2 hour past the start time of our massages. I felt awful! I couldn't even believe I had done something soooo stupid. Bah!!! I'll be seething about that mistake for some time to come!!  So yeah, call me for all party planning endeavors, cuz I rock. Well, besides my idiocy, we did manage to squeeze in about 10 hours of shopping. (We be livin' in Gallup.) And got some good eats at California Pizza Kitchen and Chipotle. I even got to taste a little Chipotle at the end of the day. It's a little ironic that I was the sickest one of the group, hardly able to stand most of the time, but ended up spending the most $$$. Oh, lucky Trav. I found a really cute swimsuit at Dillards.... some reallyyyy cute decorations for our bedroom at Kirtland... perfect pillows for our bed at TJMaxx, along with fun kids clothes/kitchen accessories/clothes for me, etc. LOVE that TJMaxx. Bought some weights for Trav's birthday at Sports Authority. Some cute shirts and jewlery, including Mother's Day gifts, at Francescas. To die for outfits at GAP for Olive. Mmmm, I think that's it. It adds up fast. :) Sure love our husbands for wrangling the kids AND financing our little shopping spree. We couldn't yank ourselves away til way past when we thought we'd leave. Loved the conversations there and back as well. Let's just say, Brinn and her skinny dipping escapades make for some CRAZYYY stories!!! Ha! I'm so blessed with amazing friends!! It was a fun little trip and we didn't get crushed by semis driving back in SNOW and ridiculous wind. Win/Win.